DESIGN PATHS MADE BY COMBINATION EFFECT OF THINKING AND LEARNING STYLES IN FIRST YEAR ARCHITECTURE STUDENTS

Ar. Anupama Chawla

Abstract

Designing by architecture students in an architecture studio is by and large due to the hard work and inspiration of a group of motivated academicians who broaden the vision of the students and try to bring out their creative talents by introspection and various studio exercises. However the concerted efforts of the faculties often fail to bring out the best in the students due to the differences in their personalities and the combination of their thinking and learning styles which may compel them to take different design paths. In a study conducted by the author across 3 different years of architecture students of the department of Architecture in an Architecture college in New Delhi, some combinations of thinking and learning styles made the same design paths in different design problems, bringing to notice the relationship between the two, irrespective of the college year. Research method was personal interviews and faculties assessment of the students work in studio. Honey and Mumford learning styles questionnaire and the Sternberg short thinking style inventory was used for the combination assessment. The results indicated an indicative link between the combinations to define certain design paths. Action research was then undertaken in the first year second semester and an extra design problem was given using modified design pedagogy. The paired t-test prove pretest-post test results and confirm the success of the intervention.